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  • Visiting Israel: Leslie will be traveling to the Holy Land at the end of May. If you have visited Israel and have some tips, we would love to have you post them in our Facebook page.
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The Good Enough Mom

Leslie Vernick

Since we just celebrated Mother’s Day in the United States, I wanted to share with you what I’ve learned about being a good enough mother.

Many of us picture a good mom as supermom. We think that our kids will do better and love us more if we do everything for them. We’re always there for them. And we sacrifice our own needs to help them and make sure there are plenty of pillows around when they fall down. But in the end, that approach cripples your child. It teaches her that she cannot be the owner of her own life because you don’t trust that she is capable of managing without you or your help.

The basic job of a good enough mother is to help your children NOT to need you when they grow up. Sure we all want a great relationship with our kids, but that relationship must mature into a more mutual and reciprocal one or it’s not healthy.

Below are essential life lessons you must teach your child (besides teaching them to know and love God).

Please do not beat yourself up if you see you fall short. This may be an opportunity for you to see parenting in a whole new way. But you won’t learn if you are upset with yourself that you didn’t know these things or do them before.

Life Lesson One: Your child must learn/experience that he/she is unconditionally loved. Unconditional love creates a secure base from which the rest of life’s lessons are absorbed. That does not mean that anything goes in terms of bad behavior, but it means that no matter how poorly your child behaves, he or she knows Mom loves me. (If this is hard for you, fill yourself up with God’s unconditional love for you).

Life Lesson Two: Every child needs to learn how to name and express his/her own emotions appropriately. For example when a child is whining, put words to their whine, “I see you are tired, or hungry, or crabby.” Doing this helps your child develop a vocabulary to express what’s going on inside of his/her body.

Life Lesson Three: Every child needs to learn how to manage and control his/her emotions, especially the more volatile or negative emotions. As a mother, validate and name your child’s emotions as well as the boundaries or limitations of expressing them. “I know you’re tired (or hungry or mad) but you cannot hit mommy.”

We live in a “feeling” dominated culture but without self-control, indulging those feelings with no boundaries will wreak havoc over one’s life and cause one to become “corrupt” or “deformed” as a person.

Life Lesson Four: Children need to understand reality and its limits. For example, “not everyone comes in first place or gets a trophy.” Sometimes we lie to our kids inflating his/her abilities or talents (you can do anything you want to do) because we want them to gain self-esteem and self-confidence. But that ultimately backfires when they come up against reality (life).

Genuine self-esteem isn’t built by false reality. Confidence in one’s ability is built by learning to do something well. Confidence is also achieved by knowing you can LEARN to do something if you need to, even if you don’t know how to do it yet.

Help your children “accept” reality rather than resist it. They will become happier rather than always feeling sullen and angry that “reality” doesn’t bend to what he/she wants it to.

Life Lesson Five: Children need to learn how to take responsibility for themselves. Being a good mom does not mean you over function and do everything for your child. You must give your child age appropriate responsibilities so that they learn how to NOT need you anymore in order to become a fully functioning adult. For example, don’t do his science project when he has procrastinated. Let your child experience the consequences of reality, a bad grade.

Life Lesson Six: Children need to learn how to identify the lies they believe and learn to think truthfully. Children will naturally lie to themselves just as adults do. Therefore a good mom corrects her child’s thinking with the truth, as appropriate to the situation and his/her age. For example, your child cries, “I’m just stupid” because she’s having problems with her math homework. You don’t do her homework for her, but you say, “Math can be difficult and it takes more effort and concentration to learn harder things. You can learn this math but it takes work. You’re not stupid.”

Parenting is hard work. I wish I would have understood these things better when I was raising children. Don’t beat yourself up, but stop knocking yourself out trying to be the hero of your child’s story. It’s much more empowering for your child to become the hero (problem solver) of his or her own life.

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Forging a Strong Mother-Daughter Bond

by Leslie Vernick

Moms want to be close to their daughters. Daughters (for the most part) want a good relationship with their moms. But when that relationship is strained by one person s attempt to control and manipulate, closeness is replaced by hurt, disappointment, anger, and fear. Leslie Vernick shares two stories of moms and daughters who learned how to move beyond the cycle of manipulation and control and give and share love honestly and without fear. By revealing how Christ calls and empowers us to love, she offers hope and practical help in breaking these destructive patterns of relating.

Two winners will be selected in our next newsletter! (Giveaway only available to U.S. residents)

If you would like to enter to win, you can click here to provide name and email address.

The winners of “The Emotionally Destructive Relationship” by Leslie Vernick are Britt T. and Brenda V.

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Upcoming
Events


Want to have Leslie speak at your event?
Click here to find out more information.


AACC
September 8th – 10th
Dallas, TX


Center for Christian Counseling
Date TBA
Madison, WI


My Daughter Is Dating A Boy She’s Crazy About

By Leslie Vernick

Question: My daughter is dating a boy she’s crazy about and he seems to be crazy about her but I don’t have a good feeling about it. She’s stopped hanging out with her friends and dropped out of some of her school activities just to spend more time with him. She met him at the church youth group but his parents do not attend our church. She’s 16 and I don’t know what to do. Her father was abusive and we’re now divorced. I don’t’ know whether I’m just hypersensitive to this whole thing or she’s picking someone like her dad. What are things I need to look for or what can I tell her?

Answer: I know it’s tempting to think you are reading into things, but I’d trust your gut instinct. Did you know that:

40% of girls age 14 to 17 report knowing someone their age who has been hit or beaten by a boyfriend.

Nearly 1 in 5 teenage girls who have been in a relationship said a boyfriend had threatened violence or self-harm if the couple were to break up.

1 in 3 teenage girls has feared for their safety in a dating relationship.

It’s important that all parents, as well as teenagers, understand what a healthy relationship looks like and be able to identify the first signs that the dating relationship may be unhealthy and potentially abusive.

People usually put their best foot forward in dating relationships. It’s not always easy to tell whether a dating relationship is healthy. However, as I’ve said before there are three essential ingredients for any relationship to flourish.

What People Are Saying About Leslie’s Book – The Emotionally Destructive Relationship

I cannot adequately put into words how meaningful your book, The Emotionally Destructive Relationship has been in my life!

I first read it 12 years ago when the Lord graciously separated me from my abusive, controlling mother. At the time I saw it as a devastating life crisis and I “lost” my parents forever. But the truth is that the Lord freed me from my enabling, tolerant patterns through your book. With Scriptures on nearly every page I had no problem understanding that SPEAK up, STAND up, STEP back was the key to being freed from a lifetime of hurt that a loving God did NOT intend for me.

12 years later I still use the book as a reliable reference and have shared it with many others who suffer from the same ignorance that I had. I have also avoided falling into other destructive pits since then because of the wisdom gained from this book.

THANK YOU Leslie for helping me heal!! I can speak of my parents and recall fond memories from childhood yet live with the separation due to their lack of repentance and stubborn selfishness.

– Jenn

LESLIE WELCOMES YOUR QUESTIONS

Leslie wants to help you grow in your personal and relational effectiveness. Please submit your questions by clicking here.

Then, visit Leslie's Blog as she posts her responses to one question per week.

Note: Due to the volume of questions that Leslie receives, she is unable to respond to every question.

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Leslie Vernick PO Box 5312 Sun City West, Arizona 85376 United States